


Didn't Know I Knew You

by little_shadow_1986



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-25 08:44:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21353452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/little_shadow_1986/pseuds/little_shadow_1986
Summary: It started with a particularly cringeworthy double entendre. Clint Barton can’t believe his luck when the sweet barista (who didn’t even bat an eyelash at how bedraggled he looked) takes a liking to him. It would be almost perfect, if there wasn’t an unnamed, unidentified, and well-masked vigilante picking off drug dealers on Clint’s watch.





	1. Chapter 1

The hairs at the back of my nose prickled from the sting of week old garbage roasting in the summer heat. Warm thermal drafts carried the stench upwards, delivering it directly to my nostrils as I perched patiently on the rooftop of an apartment building somewhere deep in Hell’s Kitchen, waiting for the drop off. My informant had been a little sketchy on the details, but assured me it was going down that night, somewhere near that street corner, at approximately that time. I would've preferred something more concrete to go off of, but beggars can't be choosers, and I was getting pretty tired of second guessing everything and hoping I was in the right place at the right time, all the time.  
Movement at the south end of the street caught my eye; a figure in jeans and a black hoodie shuffled slowly towards the corner, head swivelling from side to side like a paranoid ferret watching for owls. My fingers curled around an arrow, plucking it from the quiver with the smooth ease of experience. I couldn't tell whether this was my mark, or just a run of the mill junkie wandering the streets aimlessly on the hunt for another hit or something that could be passably defined as edible in the bins that lined the pavement. Nocking the arrow, I waited, watched, and followed his every step with the arrowhead. If he was my mark, he was supposed to be joined by another piece of low hanging fruit any moment now.  
I didn't have to wait long.  
Another skittish shadow of movement to the north drew my attention away for just a moment, just long enough to determine these were definitely the two stinkers I’d been waiting for. The second figure was hidden beneath a baseball cap and bomber jacket that was at least three sizes too big, but I’d recognise the bulge of his semi-automatic tucked into his waistband even if he was wearing three extra layers.  
I exhaled slowly, releasing the congested city stink from my nostrils and drew back on the bowstring. They'd never even know I was there, never even realise how close they were about to come to losing their undeserved lives. And I was pretty sure no one was going to be all that fussed about seeking vengeance, so it was meant to be a clean in and out job.  
Before I could loose the first arrow, the guy in the hoodie slumped unceremoniously to the ground. Half a millisecond later with barely any time to even soil himself in shock, bomber jacket hit the dirty pavement, too. A second or two after that, the twin claps of a high powered rifle pierced the air. It took me a moment to do the maths; the sniper was at least a few buildings down, maybe half a block away.  
“Shit,” I packed away my unspent arrow and folded up my custom recurve bow. “Shit, shit, shit.”  
Okay, so maybe this doesn't look like it was so bad, but an unidentified, unexpected sniper prowling the city was the last thing I needed. Who's to say the sniper wasn't a bigger baddie, a bigger problem, one that I sure as futz didn't want to run into or deal with? So yeah, this was bad. This was some knee-deep shit. I had to get out of there before things went any more pear-shaped. Not to mention I’d only just stringed this bow the night before; now I'd compromised it already with an unnecessary dry fire. Ugh.  
Bright side was, my marks were dead. Silver linings and all that, right?  
I hurled myself down the fire escapes, letting gravity carry them from one floor to the next, rolling as I hit the trash littered alley with a grunt. There was no reason for me to think that the sniper knew I was there, but that really wasn’t a risk I was willing to take. A cursory glance over the bodies as I contemplated cleaning the scene was enough to clarify that this was someone who knew what they were doing; each shot had punched a hole swiftly between the eyes, resulting in instant death.  
“Ah screw it,” I muttered. “Not my problem any more.”  
Leaving the scene for the police to deal with, I called it in anonymously from the nearest payphone, and continued on my way, almost daring to feel positive about the whole thing.  
Yeah, that feeling didn’t last very long.  
Draped all in black with a face cowl pulled up over their mouth and nose, and a deep hood casting dark shadows over their eyes, it was impossible to know whether the sniper was black, white, male or female as they stared me down from the end of the block. I couldn’t see their eyes, but I could feel them on me as they stood, still as a lethal silhouette in the night, rifle slung over their shoulder, before suddenly turning and vanishing into the shadows. An uneasy shudder slithered down my spine and settled somewhere in my intestines. My gut told me this wouldn’t be the last time I bumped into whoever it was beneath that hood, and the idea of being kissed by the barrel of their gun wasn’t exactly sitting right with the concoction of coffee and two day old pizza brewing in my stomach.  
I legged it out of there, compelling my mind to wander towards the rewarding promise of the last three slices of pizza slowly going stale in the box at home. After all, I’d earned it.


	2. Chapter 2

“Long black, make it extra black, extra long.”  
The coffee shop was mercifully quiet for that time of morning. But then, it wasn’t exactly in the most respectable part of town, so there weren't exactly many people on the block who got out of bed before midday if they could help it. To be fair, normally I would have been one of them, but thoughts of the night before hauled me from my sleep and refused to let me drift back off again. It irked me to run to Cap with every little problem, especially when I was pretty sure I could handle it on my own if things did happen to get outta hand, but...maybe it wouldn't be such a bad thing to pass the buck this time.  
“Long black for Clint?”  
I shuffled forward, still rubbing the grogginess from my eyes, and thanked the woman behind the counter as I took the steaming to-go cup and downed a mouthful with little regard for the way it scalded my oesophagus the entire way down.  
“Thanks,” I coughed once the black tar had settled in my stomach, only noticing the look on her face from the corner of my eye as I turned to leave. Raising the cup to her, I shrugged. “Long night. Needed it.”  
There was a snort of derision. “Well yeah, I can see that.” She fell silent again for a moment before giving me a thoughtful shrug, her lips tugging upwards crookedly on one corner. “Some of us just aren't made for nocturnal activities, huh?”  
“Uhhh...” Was she hitting on me? It kinda sounded like she was. She can't have been. Who would want me when I looked like a raccoon fresh out of the dumpster and probably smelled like it, too? “I guess not.”  
Smooth, Barton. Real smooth.  
For the second time in less than twenty four hours, I legged it out of there, putting some distance between myself and certain humiliation.

It should have been just another day. Just another uneventful day where I tried to function like a normal human being without clearing the band-aid aisle at the nearest CVS. My fridge was empty (shocker), and I'd eaten enough pizza and congealed take out Chinese that week to guarantee my arteries were a clogged mess. A trip to the grocery store was long overdue.  
I probably should've gone in with a list. I spent the better part of half an hour wandering aimlessly between aisles with an empty cart, before remembering milk and bread were a good place to start. It had been so long since I'd last bothered to stock up on even the essentials that I'd nearly forgotten what classified as essential beyond just ‘coffee'.  
Which reminded me that I was out of coffee, too.  
“Extra black, extra long, right?”  
I was loading my cart up with several bags of pure caffeine when the voice dragged me out of my mental debate over how many I'd need to get through the next month or so. My whole body instantly tried to collapse in on itself at just how horrendous the completely unintended double entendre really had been. I was amazed she actually seemed to be giggling at it. I think. There was this way her eyes creased at the corners and her lips quirked upwards without making a sound that suggested she was, at least.  
“Oh God,” I winced, “Did that sound as bad the first time when I said it as it did just then?”  
“Even worse actually.”   
She was grinning. Why was she grinning? Every time I opened my mouth, I sounded like an idiot.   
Oh.  
That's why she was grinning.  
“But,” she held her hands up, her face turning more solemn, but that grin was still lurking behind the crinkle of her nose, “I have heard worse. So, I can't really hold it against you too badly.”  
I winced again. “Please don’t feel like you need to soften the blow. There's no way you've heard worse than that.”  
She shrugged as she laughed, and the sound was so sweet I felt it simmer comfortingly in my belly like warm cider on an icy winter night. That smile of hers was almost lethal; the ground beneath my feet was slipping away and I was free-falling with nothing to latch onto.   
Say something, Barton. Say anything, just don't stand there gawking like an idiot with a goofy look on your face.  
“Um, so,” I said, already cringing at myself, “I should maybe let you...” I waved a hand vaguely, the words that left my mouth not even remotely reflecting my actual thoughts.  
Something flickered over her expression; disappointment maybe?  
“Right, well, it was nice to see you again, Clint.”  
Another smile, a down turned flutter of her eyelashes shielding those irises that shimmered like the blue you sink into out on the open ocean, and my heart broke at the idea of never seeing them again. She turned to leave and my heart tried to fight its way from my ribcage in its attempt to drag me towards her before she could disappear from my life entirely.  
“Wait! Uh...can I...actually, here,” I fumbled, patting my pockets down until I found a pen and an old pizza receipt. I scrawled my number down with a trembling hand, before holding it out to her, a hopeful grin stretched crookedly across my face. “Maybe I could treat you to coffee sometime?”  
When she grinned this time, it was like the wattage in the room had been cranked up tenfold.   
“I'd like that, I'd really like that. Here,” she reached out for my hand, taking the pen from me to scrawl her own digits onto my sweaty palm, “Just so now you've got mine, too. Call me any time. Or text. Either way. Unless I call you first of course.” She beamed at me with a laugh that bubbled in her throat, giving a wave as she turned to leave, before seeming to remember something. “My name's Viola, by the way. I'll see you again soon, I hope!”  
A strangled sort of squeak of shocked affirmation gurgled from my lips embarrassingly, but she was already walking away. Thank futz.


	3. Chapter 3

When I didn't hear from Viola, I decided to make a move myself. It took me two whole days though to actually hit send on the text I'd typed and retyped so many times it was a miracle I sent it at all. Every time my thumb hovered over the send icon, I would glimpse another spelling error, or realise how dorky I sounded, or simply chicken out altogether. First I tried leading with a joke, but it was too cheesy. So I tried being suave, but that didn't feel genuine. I settled on being straight to the point, but internally I started debating with myself over whether I was coming across as too brash, and ended up re-writing it again anyway, until eventually I had something that didn't make me want to kick myself too violently.  
‘Hi Viola. Can I still treat you to that coffee? Clint.’  
My heart instantly hammered a dent into my sternum the moment the message appeared in its little green bubble on the screen. No backing out now, Barton.  
I didn't even have a chance to walk away before my phone rattled against the coffee table with the arrival of a new message. The lump of nerves in my throat wrapped themselves around my windpipe and damn near strangled me as I opened it with a tap of my twitching thumb.  
‘How about that dinner and a drink instead? V’  
‘That' dinner and a drink? Was that an option we'd agreed on that I'd somehow forgotten or something? Crap...how was I supposed to respond without sounding like a dick? If I acknowledged it, it would either make it obvious I'd forgotten, and she'd think I hadn't been paying attention, or it'll turn out it was never mentioned before at all, and I'll look like an idiot for misreading her message.  
“Crap!” Lucky glanced up at me from where he was lounging in front of the TV, one ear flitting upwards as though to tell me to speak up. “Swap places with me, boy? Please? I'm not cut out for this. I'm in way over my head here.”  
He didn't answer, just rolled over to face the other wall so his back was to me, his ear flopping back down against his head.  
Sighing, I looked back at the screen, my nose wrinkling at the new message that had appeared while I was busy warring over how to respond.  
‘Did you get my message the other day?’  
What message?  
‘No...Sorry!’ I cringed as I hit send, immediately tapping out an addition. ‘My phone needs an upgrade. Apparently it eats messages.’ Another pause as I pulled a face at how unsophisticated I sounded, and finally answered her original question. ‘Dinner and a drink sounds great. Friday? 7pm at Lombardi's in Little Italy?’  
The wait for her reply was agonizing. Three minutes felt like three days.  
‘I love that place! I'll be there!’  
“She said yes.” It was almost a whisper, but Lucky tilted his head to cast a look over his shoulder with me with his remaining eye, his ear twitching as he threw me a look that made me think he would roll his eye if he could. “She said YES. Wait...oh God, she said yes.”


End file.
